MX

Preparing Your Photo
The content aware scaling feature is part of the Photo tools
.
Select your photo and from the Photo Tool fly-out bar. Select the
Content Aware Scaling button.
The right end of the InfoBar will now show a set of buttons.
Select a photo, go into the Photo Tool
, and the InfoBar should look like this;
First click the Prepare
button to prepare the photo for the scaling. This starts an analysis of the photo to calculate which parts of
the image can be stretched and which parts should be kept. This process can take some time depending
on the resolution of the photo, and how many processors your computer has.
For really high resolution images it's recommended that the image resolution be reduced if you do not
require the maximum resolution. Do this before you select the Prepare buttons. To reduce the resolution
of your photo select the Optimize
button and enter a pixel width or dpi resolution into the dialog. The image size on the page will not
change, only the resolution or number of pixels inside the photo changes.
Once you've prepared the image, new resize arrows will appear on the sides of the photo. Just drag on
these to stretch or squash the image in the desired direction.
Optimize
Photos that have been prepared to enable Content Aware resizing have a lot of additional data stored
alongside them, to enable further adjustments. When you save a document this additional data is saved
also, meaning that you can load such a document and continue to adjust the width or height without
having to do a new Prepare operation.
When you've finished scaling the photo you are recommended to 'fix' the changes by using the Optimize
feature. This will convert the stretched image back to an embedded JPEG image, at any required
resolution, and so make a substantial file size saving.
Reset
Clicking the 'Reset' button will restore the image back to its original state, removing any stretch, and
removing any mask that might have been applied.
Using Masks With Content Aware Scaling
Using the mask feature you can provide further control by protecting areas of the picture from being
distorted. Masked areas will not be distorted at all. See the Masks
chapter to find out more about masks, but here's a brief summary of how to use masks with Content
Aware Scaling.
To protect one or more areas from being distorted, select the mask at the bottom of the main toolbar on
the left of the Web Designer MX Premium window, or the menu "Window" > "Mask mode on"
.
Selecting the mask control turns on mask mode
This covers the entire drawing area in a pink colored mask layer. You can now use any of the drawing
tools to cut holes out of the mask. The easiest way to protect an area of the photo is to use the
Freehand Tool
and just draw around the object, making sure it's a closed shape (you end the drawing on the start
point).
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